Humanism, Secularism, Feminism

Taslima Nasreen

Taslima Nasreen, an award-winning writer, physician, secular humanist and human rights activist, is known for her powerful writings on women oppression and unflinching criticism of religion, despite forced exile and multiple fatwas calling for her death. In India, Bangladesh and abroad, Nasreen’s fiction, nonfiction, poetry and memoir have topped the best-seller’s list.

Taslima Nasreen was born in Bangladesh. She started writing when she was 13. Her writings won the hearts of people across the border and she landed with the prestigious literary award Ananda from India in 1992. Taslima won The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament in 1994. She received the Kurt Tucholsky Award from Swedish PEN, the Simone de Beauvoir Award and Human Rights Award from Government of France, Le Prix de l' Edit de Nantes from the city of Nantes, France, Academy prize from the Royal Academy of arts, science and literature from Belgium. She is a Humanist Laureate in The International Academy for Humanism,USA. She won Distinguished Humanist Award from International Humanist and Ethical Union, Free-thought Heroine award from Freedom From Religion foundation, USA., IBKA award, Germany,and Feminist Press Award, USA . She got the UNESCO Madanjeet Singh prize for Promotion of the Tolerance and Non-violence in 2005. She received the Medal of honor of Lyon. She got honorary citizenship from Paris, Nantes, Lyon, Metz, Thionville, Esch etc. Taslima was awarded the Condorcet-Aron Prize at the “Parliament of the French Community of Belgium” in Brussels and Ananda literary award again in 2000.

Bestowed with honorary doctorates from Gent University and UCL in Belgium, and American University of Paris and Paris Diderot University in France, she has addressed gatherings in major venues of the world like the European Parliament, National Assembly of France, Universities of Sorbonne, Oxford, Harvard, Yale, etc. She got fellowships as a research scholar at Harvard and New York Universities. She was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow in the USA in 2009.

Taslima has written 35 books in Bengali, which includes poetry, essays, novels and autobiography series. Her works have been translated in thirty different languages. Some of her books are banned in Bangladesh. Because of her thoughts and ideas she has been banned, blacklisted and banished from Bengal, both from Bangladesh and West Bengal part of India. She has been prevented by the authorities from returning to her country since 1994, and to West Bengal since 2007.

EVENTS

Religion Sucks

Islamic scholars in today’s world are not as cruel as Allah. Allah permits men to beat up women. But these scholars try their best to save Allah by saying that Allah does not mean it. What does He mean? Scholars say, He means men should beat up their wives with ‘kindness and respect’. Wow, it would definitely get UN’s approval.

A man that would beat his wife is not a man, he’s a punk. Men, in general, are physically larger and have greater upper body strength. There is nothing honorable about beating on someone weaker than you. Men evolved these characteristics IMO in order to protect the women in our lives, not to hurt them or exert our dominance over them. These men are cowards and assholes. Fuck them, I wouldn’t cross the street to spit in their eye.

There are interesting discussions of these issues on Saudi blogsites attached to a whole range of media including mainstream newspapers.
Although google translate is imperfect it seems that many of the “Beat your wife” clerics get criticised, denounced, satirised and condemned.

Criticism of religion within Saudi is nothing new, but perhaps more people are willing to speak about it. Unfortunately migrant workers are not exposed to this, because there are significant obstacles put in the way of these people learning fluent Arabic, or socialising with people (long working hours, separate housing etc). Many South Asian moslems just want to become more obedient moslems when they go there.

Criticism of religion within Pakistan seems to carry mortal risk in 2012.
Despite adverse media criticism we do not see condemnation of rule by lynch mob from mainstream American politicians who seem to defend fundamentalism in Israel and their own political parties.

Much of the inconvenience of modern air travel can be blamed on religion. You have to take off your shoes and be body searched just to get to departure gate. In reality quite a few terrorist attempts have been thwarted by alert passengers, rather than state security measures.
The people who pass anti-terrorist legislation are often religious. Bush and Blair are notorious examples.

Hi Taslima
My name is Mona 38 from Egypt. I am a born Muslim. I got so many questions concerning my religion.I am sure some hadith don’t make sense at all,but in general its the religion I know and acquainted to.I pick what I like, I leave what I am not convinced with. No body is forcing me to do anything that I don’t like. Why is all the grudge you have towards it ? You can be a Muslim and still be free. Don’t follow the sheikh and their stupid interpretations. Just follow your heart and great brain god gave you.

Seeing the above conversation with yourself and Mona gave me great joy as a woman and a feminist.

Right now we are fighting a sect of ultra orthodox Jews that live in Beit Shemesh. These men are spitting on little girls because they’re not dressed ‘modestly’ and these Hareidim are refusing to ride on the same buses as women. These men even staged a protest comparing the Israeli government to Nazi’s. They put themselves in a jail like apparatus, sewed a yellow Magen David on their jail-like coats to protest against the rights of women.

I am not an atheist but I will keep fighting for our rights across all cultures and times.

Probably the kind of environment you have been brought up in failed to show you the positives of religion and so you have finally deduced that religion stops you from following your heart and the great brain we have been gifted . Although, I am in complete agreement with you, when you say, that the fundamentalist have spoiled the aura we live in today. As I see, most of the extremist have deduced many verses of the Quran in a wrong way and that has mayhem that we see every day in our lives. But I see that you are following somewhat similar footsteps of those fundamentalist not in the same direction, but almost parallel. The followers of a religion will not give you the right idea of what a religion is. So refrain yourself from scholars whose words instill such hatred. And instead try to find things out as what a particular thing might mean. The way your poems and writings reflect your ideas best in Bengali. Similarly, the verses from any books reflect the ideas underneath in their original language. Reading a translated version would do a similar harm that has been done to your translated books. Do ponder over this.

A man should always respect a female and vice versa.We all are having a soul , and the energy of soul is equal in female and male. Our body is only a manifested form which is having the soul for a short period of time.The power of soul is equal in male and female. God is the creator of every thing and he loves everything even every animals.His love toward man and woman is same. He is not cruel and thus he can never say that a man can beat a woman.